A Fragile Ascent
by SenLinYu
Summary: A sequel to A Slow Cruel Descent. The War is over. Voldemort is dead. And Hermione Granger is broken. COMPLETE.
1. Part 1

_Author's Note: This is a two chapter sequel to my one-shot, A Slow Cruel Descent. I highly recommend reading that first because I don't think this will make very much sense otherwise._

 _I hope you guys like it, I was very nervous about trying to continue the story. Please let me know. Reviews breathe life into me._

 _oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo_

Is it possible to know if you are sane? Hermione Granger asked herself the question for the thousandth time that year. She had concluded, after mulling it over the first several hundred times, that it probably wasn't.

She sighed quietly and tucked a curl behind her ear.

Perhaps she was insane.

It would be easier. Easier for almost everyone.

There were certainly enough people eager to believe it. So many people who considered it a convenient answer. Hermione Granger, poor dear, she lost her mind in the war.

It would have made things so much simpler for everyone. It would have spared her all the tests. All the testimonies. All the skeptical, pitying glances. The pictures of herself splashed across the pages of The Daily Prophet. Spared Harry from having to take advantage of his hero status. Spared Ron from the awkward conversations about their presumed relationship with her had never started.

If everyone could just agree that Hermione Granger had lost her mind, everything would be a lot easier.

Some days Hermione wished that it could be that easy. The mad people she had encounter seemed far happier and freer than she was. She didn't feel mad at all.

She felt so sane it hurt.

Six months. She had made it six months. Dragged herself through by sheer determination.

Sometimes they had felt longer than the whole war.

It was an awful thing to think. The war had been terrible. All those years and deaths. Grinding on and on. But at least the war had been shared. There were people who understood. She had been fighting for something vast and important. Fighting for herself was much harder. The last six months had been her own unique and private agony.

While the whole world was moving on, she was frozen in time. Waiting.

Six months.

She felt like she'd been drowning the whole time.

There was a grating sound that tore her abruptly from her thoughts. She blinked and shook her head. Her curl sprang free of her ear and the drab waiting room she was seated in swam back into focus. The door across the room swung open and Draco Malfoy walked through. Her stomach flipped and dropped sharply.

When his eyes landed on her a look of despair came over his face.

She got to her feet and stared at him.

Six months. Six months in Azkaban. All other Death Eaters has gotten life sentences but Harry Potter had demanded Draco Malfoy's be reduced. Six months was the lowest Harry could convince the Wizengamot to agree to.

Six months and Draco was already nothing but skin and bones. He looked almost like a corpse. Deathly pale. The life seemingly sucked out of him. His eyes were mostly blank. There was nothing but pain in them.

The guard shoved a clipboard into Hermione's hands and she shakily signed her name in triplicate.

"He's all yours," the burly man muttered before exiting the room. Leaving her alone with Draco.

"Granger," he said after several minutes of silence.

"Draco," she replied. She didn't ask him how he was. She didn't comment on how long it had been. What do you say to someone who just spent six months having every shred of happiness sucked out of them while they shivered in a desolate cell?

"Why are you here?" he finally asked.

"I'm in charge of your release," she said. "All Azkaban parolees are required to have a legal guardian accept responsibility for them. Normally it's a next of kin, but you don't have any. I volunteered."

Draco suddenly looked both corpse-like and nauseated.

"You what?" he rasped. "There was no one else? Isn't Potter related to me? He's my fifth cousin twice removed. Or the Weasleys. We're eighth cousins."

Hermione ignored the stab of hurt and stared at him steadily.

"Harry would have, but he's a bit busy. I'm not really doing anything," she said.

He blinked and grew more pale.

"Granger—" he said unsteadily. He didn't say anything else. As though the words stuck in his throat.

Hermione pressed on, "You're not allowed to have your wand until you've completed a three month probationary period. I'll help you travel anywhere you want to go. Do you want me to take you to the manor and help you resettle there?"

"No—!" he said and his voice cracked faintly.

"Alright," she said. Without thinking she stepped toward him and extended her hand. He stepped sharply away from her. Backing up until the wall stopped him.

Hermione withdrew her hand and looked at him. Trying to breathe evenly. To stay focused. The healers had said, staying focused on what was happening was important.

She couldn't let herself stress and get caught on details. When she got caught on details she tended to obsess. When she'd obsess, her thoughts would start to spiral. When she'd spiral she'd get drawn down. Down down down. Down into nothing. Until there was nothing. Nothing.

Nothing—

"Granger."

She blinked.

Draco was no longer several feet away from her. He had suddenly reappeared only a few inches away. His hands were around her shoulders as he stared down at her. Her curl that had kept slipping out and getting in her eyes was gone. She could feel it tucked carefully behind her ear.

She hadn't put it there.

She looked up into his face.

She recognized the emotions in his eyes.

Worried. Devastated

She dropped her eyes.

"Sorry," she said trying not to give in to the tears stabbing at the corners of her eyes. She'd hoped—she'd practiced so much. She'd taken all her potions.

She had thought she could manage it.

"You still...?" he asked. His hands were still on her shoulders. They felt warm and familiar.

She wondered how much time had passed.

"Sometimes," she said, unable to meet his eyes.

"How often?"

"Not that much," she lied, "It's not normally much of an issue. If they last too long—or if there are crowds—I just end up back in St Mungo's for a few days."

"Days…?" Draco said hollowly.

The pained expression on his face made her lose track of her deception slightly. "It's not a big deal. As I said, I'm not really doing anything. It—I think it happens less when I don't go out. Or at least, when it does, there's no one to see. No picture in the papers. No hospital visits. Just—a skip. And then, when I come out of it I make sure I eat something."

"You're living alone?"

She looked away from him and stared into a corner.

"It's easier—I tried to live at the Burrow but the noise and unpredictability made it worse. And then Harry invited me to live with him, but—he and Ginny—it stressed me. Trying to keep out of the way. Worrying I was ruining a moment. So, I got a place of my own. And the healers made this bracelet," she pulled up her sleeve and showed the bangle around her wrist. "If I don't move for more than four hours it sends an alert to Harry."

"Granger…" he sounded on the verge of crying.

"Anyway," she hurried on without thinking. "If you don't want to go to the manor, do you want to come to my place?"

She blanched as she realised what she'd said. She had not meant to extend that invitation.

"Oh, no that's silly," she said trying to backtrack, "I can take you to Gringotts to get your finances in order. Then we can look into places in Diagon Alley. There are a lot of hotels and short term rentals options there."

His hands on her shoulders shook faintly. She glanced up and realised he was staring at the wall behind her head. She wondered if he even realised his hands were still on her. They kept gripping her tighter and tighter as though he expected her to shatter if he let go.

He gasped slightly after a few moments. As though he'd forgotten to breathe while he was deciding what to do.

"Your place, I suppose. Until we figure something else out," he finally said in a hard voice.

Her heart sank.

She steeled herself. It would only be for a day. She could manage it for a day. If she just were more careful. It had probably just been nerves. She'd could be fine for a day.

She nodded and put her hand on his wrist. She closed her eyes and apparated them both.

They reappeared by a stone cottage near a beach.

Hermione looked over at Draco.

"It's not a manor," she said awkwardly.

"It's nice," he said.

He had just gotten out of prison, she thought. Probably anywhere would be nice. Even a tent. Or a cave.

"You can wash," she said as she led him inside, "and I'll warm up some food. You're so thin."

He didn't say anything in reply as he went into the bathroom. She hurried into the kitchen and started warming the stew she had made the day before.

She kept herself busy. Moving from one task to the next. Maintain the flame beneath the cauldron. Slice the bread. Soften the butter. Straighten the table cloth.

Keep focused on what was happening.

She tried not to worry about losing herself again. If she worried it would stress her. If she were stressed she'd start getting stuck on details. If she were stuck on details she'd…

She forced herself to stop thinking through the sequence. Check the cauldron. Was it enough bread? He was so thin. Maybe she should slice more. She hadn't set the table yet.

She didn't want to lose herself again. She didn't want him to think he stressed her. If he thought that he'd get worried. If he was worried he might get inquisitive…

She straighten the table cloth. She kept looping. The basket was overflowing with sliced bread by the time he emerged from the bathroom, showered and changed into the robes she'd brought him.

She stilled and stared at him.

"I made beef stew," she said.

She watched him eat two bowlfuls. She buttered bread and kept shoving across the table at him.

Finally he set his spoon down and stared at her.

"I don't understand," he said, "You were better. When I left it had been weeks since you had dissociated. What happened?"

She stared at him, frozen for several seconds, uncertain of what to say.

As the seconds ticked by his eyes suddenly widened and his mask of reserve slipped. He expression became devastated and he started to lean toward her.

Right—he thought…

She had to say something.

"It started after you left," she blurted. Her eyes widened in horror when she realised what she'd admitted.

His expression crumbled and his eyes grew mirrorlike.

"They think maybe it was just shock," she said looking away from him. Running a fingernail along the checkered print on the table cloth. "They thought after a while I'd recalibrate."

"Potter didn't tell me," Draco said, his voice was shaking and his expression was furious. "I asked about you and he said you were fine."

"I told him to," Hermione said. "You would have worried. It would have made it harder and you couldn't have done anything. I told him to say I was fine."

She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders, "And I am fine. It's not like I'm dying. I just get—a bit lost sometimes. It doesn't matter."

Draco's expression grew disdainful. "You live in a cottage by yourself in—Where are we? Wales? And you aren't doing anything," he said in a flat voice. "That's not fine. Not for you."

"Why not? Is it mandated somewhere that I need to be doing something? I'm entitled to have time if I want it," she said defensively, folding her arms and meeting his eyes.

"Really? That's what this is? Time?" He quirked an eyebrow. "This is what you dreamed about doing after the war? Wales. Not that Potions Mastery you talked about? Not visiting Ilvermorny's transfiguration lab? Not that coven internship in the Black Forest? This is what you really wanted. A cottage in the middle of nowhere all by yourself."

Hermione glared at him and tried to keep from crying. She had forgotten how mean he was. How he poked at things that everyone else had to decency to dance around.

"What? Do you want me to say I'm broken? Would that make either of us feel better?"

"It would be honest," he seethed. "Were you even going to tell me they'd started again? You weren't. I could tell by your face in the waiting room. You were horrified that I knew."

Hermione stared at him for several seconds, hesitating.

"You are in love with me," she said.

He froze and stared at her. His face slowly growing pale.

"You never said so, but I knew. All those months. I watched you. I was always watching you. I knew that you fell for me. It happened slowly. But by the end, you had fallen as hard as I had. That was part of why I was so desperate to protect you from the Order. I knew you weren't going to leave me or try to use me to protect yourself. Even though you could have."

"So this is what? Pity?" His expression grew closed. "I don't want your help. I didn't want Potter's help. I was perfectly willing to die in Azkaban. But instead you lot dragged me out. Apparently in order to expand on whatever fucked up thing it is that exists between us. While you lied—and tried to pretend you were alright."

He stood up so abruptly his chair fell backwards as he stared down at her. There were a thousand emotions in his eyes. He dragged his fingers through his hair.

"Granger," he said in a broken voice. "What is the point of all this supposed to be?"

She had no answer.

He stood there for a second longer before turning on his heel and storming outside.

Hermione watched him go. Her heart was pounding. She looked down at the bread she had been buttering.

A walk would be good for him. The beach was ideal. The crash of the waves. The wind. The harsh beauty. It was a ragged, imperfect place. It wasn't tranquil or quiet. It looked like she felt inside.

Probably how he felt too.

She stood up, took the dishes to the sink, and started washing them by hand. As she stood there she turned his question over and over in her mind.

What was the point of all this supposed to be?

She didn't know.

She just didn't know how to move on. What had happened between them felt incomplete. Painful. Like a wound that wouldn't close. Every time she tried to move on. Tried to go out. Tried to be alright…

It felt like something were dragging its claws inside of her. Making a hole that kept getting larger and more agonising every time she tried to do so much as breathe.

She couldn't move on. Not when he was being unfairly punished for something he had been as forced into as she had. He didn't deserve to rot in Azkaban. He deserved a second chance. To have a life. To live free from the endless, destructive grind of war. He deserved to move on after what he'd done for her.

She sighed and set a plate on the dish rack.

Why hadn't she been able to stop herself from spiraling in the waiting room?

Her hands shook faintly as she thought about it. She couldn't even hold on for five minutes in front of him.

It had ruined everything. She had just wanted to pretend that everything was fine. Help him settle in. See that he was alright. If she did that, she thought, she'd be able to move on.

She just wanted him to be alright. If he were alright, maybe she'd be able to be alright too. Maybe, if she wasn't always worrying about him, her mind would stop running away.

Now everything was spoiled. He was worried. He was angry at her. He probably thought he was responsible for her again. That she had brought him to her cottage to force him to be her keeper. To use his feelings as leverage.

It wasn't what she wanted. She had just wanted to see him again. To know he wasn't suffering.

She kept scrubbing his bowl. Over and over.

She should take him somewhere else while he was still angry. She had pamphlets about rooms available in Diagon Alley. She would go get them out. He could go almost anywhere by himself from Diagon Alley. He wouldn't need her help after that.

It would be for the best.

She didn't want him to feel caged by her.

It had been foolish to think that seeing him again would somehow fix her.

This was just the way things were now. This was how she was.

She thought sadly about Ilvermony. About a Potions Mastery. About the Black Forest coven internship. Impossible things for someone who habitually vanished into their own mind.

She'd nearly burned down Harry's flat trying to brew potions. His wards had gone off and Harry had rushed home and found her standing blankly in the kitchen beside a cauldron of pepperup potion that had caught fire and been on the verge of exploding across the room.

It had taken five hours for her snap out of the daze. She stopped brewing after that.

It was fine.

She was fine. She was alive.

She was happy in Wales. She had books. She liked walking along the seashore. The faucets and shower and stove were all charmed to turn themselves off after fifteen minutes. Harry and Ron came to visit all the time. It was a lot better than ending up committed in the Janus Thickey Ward. If she dissociated in her cottage there was no one to know. No one to worry.

She should take Draco to Diagon Alley before her mind ran away again.

Even if she couldn't see him… just knowing he wasn't in prison would be a relief. The papers would probably write about him a bit. And Harry would keep an eye out and tell her.

If Draco was alright she would worry less. If she worried less maybe her stress levels would drop. If she wasn't stressed she might get less caught on details. She'd stop spiraling. Then maybe she'd actually be able to be alright. She wouldn't get lost. She'd be fine. It would be fine.

It would.

She was fine—

She blinked.

Draco was kissing her.

The moment before she'd been in the kitchen washing the dishes. Now they were both seated on the couch. His palm was pressed against the side of her neck, his long fingers gently tangled in her hair. His lips were cool, sweet, and familiar against hers.

Her hands darted up and gripped his robes as she kissed him back fiercely. Crushing her lips his. Trying not to cry. Sliding one hand up into his hair as she pressed herself closer to him and his arm slipped around her waist.

Then she remembered herself.

She let go and jumped back quickly.

"Sorry," she blurted out and looked away with embarrassment. Her hands were dry but the fingertips shriveled, as though they'd been sitting in water for a long time. She glanced around the room and realized the sky was red with the first rays of sunset. It had been hours.

"Sorry," she said again, pressing her lips together and trying not to cry in frustration.

Draco didn't say anything. He just watched her with a sad, pensive expression.

"I was thinking," she said hurriedly, her voice slightly shrill and shaking faintly. "A room in Diagon Alley would probably be ideal. I don't know why we came here. This can't be comfortable for you. Diagon is much better. You'll be able to travel easily there, so you won't have to worry—After this I won't—I should have just let Harry—I didn't mean—"

Her voice failed her and she sobbed faintly under her breath. She jumped to her feet.

"Harry picked up some information for you," she said, hurrying over to her desk and gathering up a bundle of papers about the various hotels and short-term flat rentals in Diagon Alley. "Here. You can look over them and let me know where you want me to take you. Gringotts is closed, but I can cover you for a few nights. If you want to pay me back you can owl me or do a transfer through Gringotts. Just remind me to give you my account information."

She put everything on the coffee table and then spun and darted into the next room. Snatching a heavy wool jumper off the hook she rushed through the door and down to the beach.

As she reached the tideline she stopped and stared down at the the ocean debris. Broken shells and driftwood and bits of mangled seaweed. She looked out at the incoming tide and brought her fingers over her mouth as she started to cry.

Draco's lips against hers had brought everything rushing back and crashing down on her like a tidal wave. Confronting her with all the lies she kept telling herself.

That she simply needed to see him once so she could know he'd be alright.

But her stress wasn't just worry. She missed him, bitterly. She hadn't realised how keenly she craved him until she felt him touch her. And she found herself kissing him with all the fierce affection she was endlessly burning with.

She'd thought she could ignore it.

Until she felt his hand caressing her as he pressed his lips against hers. Until she'd felt herself in his arms, and him in hers. In that moment, for one perfect second, everything had felt good again.

She'd forgotten what feeling good was like.

But it only lasted for an instant before the horror of reality crashed down upon her.

He was kissing her because she'd dissociated again. In order to bring her back. Her stomach had dropped sharply as she wrench herself away. And as his hands fell away she was struck by the realisation that the hole she felt being clawed inside of her was the pain of his absence.

It was as though somewhere along the way their souls had fused. And when he'd left it was like he'd been torn out of her.

She'd been bleeding to death ever since.

She brushed the tears away and started walking down the beach.

What was it that existed between them? The fucked up thing that had tied them together so irrevocably.

It wasn't the love potion any longer. She was certain of that. She'd felt when the antidote suddenly counteracted it. That drugged devotion was gone. The endless, irresistible compulsion to do anything, anything in the world to protect Draco. The desperate obsession that had forced her to betray and murder her friends while her mind screamed and tore itself apart with guilt. It was gone. The antidote had swept through and excised it.

But when reason returned to her in a flood Draco Malfoy hadn't reverted in her eyes.

The love potion hadn't made her generally delusional. It didn't attribute imaginary qualities to him in order for her to love him. It had simply made her love him. Exactly as he was. Willing to do anything for him. Anything to protect him.

When he was spiteful and resentful. When he gradually grew guilt-ridden and concerned. And as he slowly became kind. Then sad and affectionate. And finally adoring and devastated.

She saw him change. As he went from ignoring her to watching over her as carefully as she watched over him.

When the love potion vanished and she began to grasp what had happened she discovered she had actually fallen for him. Not with irrational devotion but with the same adoring devastation that he had for her.

It wasn't a revelation that had gone over well with anyone.

Stockholm Syndrome. After-effects from the love potion. Just another symptom of her fractured mental state. Not real.

Certainly not real.

They kept re-dosing her with the antidote. Nothing changed her mind.

After all those months trying to created an antidote. Everyone had expected her to be enraged when she was finally cured. Aurors swept in and arrested Draco within minutes of her swallowing it out of concern that she would try to murder him the moment the scales fell from her eyes.

But instead she still loved him.

It was like some sick joke by Fate. Ron had cried when he realised it. Harry had been the only person who wasn't surprised.

Almost anyone else in the world would have been more acceptable. Anyone but Draco Malfoy.

She wasn't supposed to fall for someone she'd been drugged into loving. She wasn't supposed to fall for her keeper. For someone she'd murdered her friends to protect. It was not supposed to happen.

But that didn't matter to Hermione. It didn't matter if it was sick sounding. It didn't matter if it was doomed. She wanted Draco.

She wanted him to look at her without looking guilt stricken. She wanted him to kiss her solely because he wanted to. Not because he needed to bring her mind back. Not because he was sorry.

But it didn't matter what she wanted.

None of it mattered.

If he stayed with her it would be because he felt guilty and responsible for her. Even though he loved her, that wouldn't be why he was there.

He deserved to move on.

She was stuck but he wasn't. He wasn't broken. He could have a life. A good life. He could get over her and eventually fall in love with someone who could make him happy. Someone who could give something back to him.

She wasn't his responsibility. Her condition wasn't his fault. He'd done everything he could to help her hold on and keep her mind intact. To give her any scrap of happiness he could offer her. Even after the war when he didn't need to. He'd given up his chance to run and stayed to take care of her. He'd lived with her in the hospital nearly a year helping her recover. He'd given her the antidote, fully expecting her to hate and try to kill him after she'd swallowed it.

It wasn't his fault she was broken. If he became trapped by her it wouldn't fix things. It would just create an additional victim in the sad life of Hermione Granger.

She had so many victims.

Draco could move on.

She had to let him go. She had to convince him she'd be alright so he could go.

But she didn't know how. She didn't know how to pretend to be alright. She wasn't even sure what being alright was anymore.

She kept trying, but every time—

Hermione halted suddenly on her trek along the beach and sobbed.

She didn't know how long she stood there weeping. When her tears finally subsided, she smeared them away and discovered the sun had slipped beyond the horizon. She stood for a few moments longer catching her breath. Then she started to head back to the cottage. Turning she found Draco standing behind her, about ten feet back.

She stared at him, heart pounding, for several seconds. How long had he been there?

"Why are you here?" she finally asked.

"I was worried about you," he said as he walked closer.

"You don't need to," she said in a stiff voice. "I can take care of myself. I don't ever go past the tideline, just in case I—" her voice faltered. She always struggled to say 'dissociate.' "In case I get lost for a bit."

She brushed away the residual tears on her face and squared her shoulders.

"Did you find a place you wanted me to take you?" she asked.

She stared up at him hoping she didn't look as haunted as she felt. This was probably the last time she would ever see him.

It had been such a mistake to try to see him again. To think it would make things better. She'd made things harder for both of them. Shattered the illusion. If she had just stayed away he certainly would have been able to move on. He would have thought she was alright. That she wasn't his responsibility anymore.

Now she'd ruined that for him.

"Granger, I'm not going to leave you alone here," he said.

A lump formed in her throat. The number of tears she could cry over him were apparently limitless. She blinked hard, willing them away.

"You're not responsible for me. And I'm not alone. Harry and Ron visit all the time. I don't need you," she said, staring across the darkening sea.

"Why did you volunteer as my guardian?" he asked, studying her carefully.

She shrugged feeling hopeless.

"I thought—I thought if I saw that you were alright that it would help," she said. "We never got to talk. I asked you to stay—but then aurors came and arrested you. I thought—if I helped you—it would give me closure."

"So this was goodbye."

"Yes. It was," she said looking down at her hands.

"I'm not going to leave you here," he said.

"You should. You should go. I don't want you to stay here because you feel responsible for me," she said, her face twisting in misery.

He studied her for several minutes in silence.

"Granger, after you took the antidote, why did you ask me to stay?"

Her stomach flipped and she grasped for an answer she could give him that was enough of the truth that he'd believe it.

"I—I watched you change. While we were together. You changed. The love potion, it didn't do anything to affect my perception of things. It just made me love you. l couldn't stop myself. You were so angry. I knew you hated me. I knew you wanted Voldemort to kill me. I knew you were spiteful. The love potion didn't prevent me from knowing that. I just loved you anyway," she said, watching as the tide slowly approached.

"But then, you stopped hating me. You started feeling guilty. And I saw that. You were kind to me. You stopped blaming me. You became sadder and sadder when my mind started slipping away. Not because you were worried about yourself, but because you were worried about me. You started caring about me. I thought for a long time I was just imagining it—seeing something that wasn't there because of how much I wanted it. But eventually I realised you really did."

The water was getting closer. An anxious wave hurried far ahead of the rest and lapped at the rocks only a few feet away. Then it slid back down the beach to the ocean.

"You could have drugged me," she said. "There are dozens of dark potions you could have dosed me with to protect yourself. I know you knew about them. You could have addicted me to a few of them and then kept re-dosing me to keep me alive. Using them to siphon out my life force and use it to keep my mind in stasis. If you hadn't cared about slowly poisoning me to death, they would have worked for however the long the war lasted. If you'd ever asked me to take them, you know, I would have done it for you. I would have even made them myself if you'd asked."

She glanced over him. She meant to look away but found she couldn't drag her eyes away from his face once she let them rest there. She'd studied it a thousand times but she always wanted to look again.

He was all she saw when she closed her eyes. Even in her nightmares. He was always beside her.

Prison had made him gaunt. His skin was papery thin and tightly drawn across his bones. In the light of dusk his pale features and hair seemed almost luminous. His eyes were as sad as her own. As though somewhere along the way he and she had become mirrors of each other.

"There were countless ways you could have protected yourself if you hadn't cared about me," she said. "When you gave me the antidote—and I finally understood what had happened—it didn't stop me from realising everything you'd done for me. And at least in my case—I thought it was real. But you—you started to care for me, even though you knew I was only like that because of a potion."

"So, it was pity," he said, staring out at the sea.

Hermione felt her heart-breaking.

She closed her eyes.

She had to let him go. He could move on. He deserved to move on. She opened her eyes and looked at him steadily.

"Yes," she lied. "I didn't think you deserved to think I hated you."

"And that's all?" he said, glancing over to look at her carefully. The silver of his eyes flickered and gleamed like moonlight.

"That's all," she said firmly. "I just wanted to know you were alright so we could both move on."

"How are you planning to move on?" he asked.

"I—," her voice died in her throat.

His expression became challenging, his eyes narrowed as he came closer to her. She skittered back and fought against the urge to cry. Again. Trying to drag her eyes away from his face.

"You aren't going to," he said in an accusing tone. "You're just planning on staying here. Hiding. Out of the way. Where "there's no one to see." While the rest of the world moves on from the war and pretends that everything ended up happily."

"People deserve to move on," she said, angry at the spiteful and derisive way he said it. "I would love to move on. Shoving it in everyone's faces the fact that I can't doesn't fix anything. It just drags more people down with me."

She was breathing raggedly.

"And that's what you think I should do? Just move on?" he said, his eyes were flashing.

"You deserve to move on," she said, crying. "You've earned that. You were almost as much a victim as I was. I don't want you to be responsible for me again."

"Well, I don't want to be protected by you again, Granger!" he snapped.

She stared at him hopelessly.

"Draco—" she said, her voice breaking and trailing off in a whimper. "Let me do this…"

He drew nearer so that she had to look up to see his face. The wind caught his hair and dragged it over his eyes and Hermione had to fight against the urge to lift her hand up and brush it away. Had to struggle against the desire to press her body against his, bury her face in his chest and hope he'd hold her the way he used to.

"If it's just pity?" he said, "If it's just closure? Why did you kiss me back? The love potion is gone. You had no reason to."

Hermione's mouth fell open as she stared up at him trying to think of an explanation.

Draco continued, "Why are you so anxious to make me leave? Why run away to the beach and cry for half an hour? Why do you—"

He broke off and hesitated as though he was afraid of what he was about to say next.

"Why—," he started, his voice shaking as though he were crying. "Why are you still looking at me the way you did before you took the antidote?"

"I—," Hermione struggled to breathe and tried to think of a lie. She couldn't. "Please go. Having you here is hurting me."

"Why?" he demanded.

"Because—," her voice sounded like she was a wounded animal. "I want you to stay and I hate myself for it."

"Why are you so afraid of having me stay? Tell me the truth."

"Because I love you," she admitted, sobbing.

He grew deathly pale and his expression became horrified as he stepped sharply back from her.

"And that—," she said, eyeing the space between them, her chest stuttering as she tried to stop crying. Tried to ignore the hurt she felt as he abruptly withdrew. "That is why I didn't want to tell you."

"How—"

"I told you. I saw you change. By the end, I actually loved you. That… was why I asked you to stay with me."

"It's probably an after-effect," he said, looking devastated. "Or maybe the dosage of the antidote was insufficient."

"That's what the Order thought. They had me re-dosed until the healers became concerned about permanent internal damage."

He opened his mouth as though he were going to offer another idea, she cut him off.

"Then they thought maybe Stockholm Syndrome. But the diagnoses didn't really align. I was already in love with you. So then they concluded it was either real or the delusion was just too deeply rooted for me to let go of it. Especially when my dissociation came back after you left. So then most people concluded that I had just lost my mind. There was a push to have my permanently committed into the Janus Thickey Ward. That it would be the kindest thing for me. But Harry and the Weasleys' wouldn't hear of it. They helped me pass the psychological exams. It was determined I wasn't a danger to anyone. So as long as I don't take off my monitor charm I can't be forcibly committed. It's not as though there's a law about who you're allowed to be in love with. Or against having dissociative fugues."

Draco looked like he was about to either be sick or have an emotional breakdown. A lot of people had looked at her in a similar way.

"Tell me where you want to go in Diagon Alley, and I'll take you there," she said in a dead voice.

She felt on the verge of spiraling again. She wanted to. Down. Down. Down. Where she wouldn't think anymore. Wouldn't feel.

She just needed to get him put somewhere else. He couldn't come back once he was gone. Not for three months at least. Then she could just—

Go...

"Granger, I'm not going to leave you here," he said, his expression had become sad and pensive again. It caused something inside Hermione to snap.

"Well, I don't want you here!" she shouted at him angrily. "I don't want you to be here because you feel guilty and responsible for me. I don't want to be atonement for you. I don't want to be kissed because I've dissociated. I don't want you to pretend to believe me while you privately think I'm just broken and mad and hate yourself for it. I don't want it to be like that. I'd rather just be alone!"


	2. Part 2

"Now tell me now where you want to go. Because if you don't I'm going to apparate you to your manor," Hermione said, panting angrily, her wand clenched in her fist. Her jaw was set. Her mind made up.

"Granger, if you make me leave, you know all I will do is worry about you. And it won't matter who you send to lie to me."

Hermione stood rigidly for a moment before her shoulders slumped and she turned away from him. Frustrated and at a loss.

He closed the space between them and grasped her wrist to turn her back toward him. His fingers were cold from the wind. Then he tilted her face up to look at him.

"Let me stay here with you," he said quietly. "I won't do anything you don't want me to. Just let me stay so I know you're alright."

"Surely, there's somewhere else you'd rather go," she said miserably. She pulled her face away from his touch.

"Where do you think I should go?" he asked.

She hesitated. Any of his friends who weren't dead were imprisoned.

"Anywhere. You can go anywhere," she said.

"What would the point be? I barely left my manor even before the end of the war. There were few places that I found comfortable then. I imagine there are even fewer now. I highly doubt you could even get me a room without pulling strings. And if you did, they'd probably still throw me out after you left. Unless we go to Knockturn Alley."

That was a dirty card to play. She hadn't really anticipated that he wouldn't want to go back to his manor. Although in retrospect it wasn't surprising. The last time he'd been there was the day Voldemort died. Her clothes were probably still in his room.

"You—can stay," she finally agreed reluctantly. "But if you want to leave you have to promise you'll tell me. I don't want you staying here to spare my feelings. And if I—if I dissociate—just leave me. Don't kiss me. I don't want you to kiss me—anymore."

He nodded in agreement.

"Alright," he said.

"Alright," she said, stepping away from him and turning to walk back to the cottage.

Time moved slowly.

Hermione felt nervous. Draco's residence within her cottage completely overshadowed her mind.

When they were in the same room his presence was all she could think about it. And when he wasn't, his absence was was all she could think about.

She was so worried.

Worried she'd give in and reach for him instinctively. That she'd break down and beg him not to think she had lost her mind; to give them a chance. She was always afraid she'd turn around to find him watching her with guilt and pity in his eyes. And she was terrified that eventually he would decide to leave and she'd be unable to bear it. That she'd try to convince him to stay. And the thought that he would stay horrified her as much as her terror that he wouldn't.

She'd start worrying about it. Start obsessing. When she'd obsess, she'd spiral. And then down she'd go. Again. And again.

When she'd blink she'd always find Draco there. Waiting for her.

Sometimes he'd be talking to her. Most of the time she'd find herself sitting next to him on the couch while he read a book.

He was always holding her hand.

He wasn't upset or worried. He was just—there. Whenever her mind ran away. He was always there, waiting for her to come back.

When he noticed she had re-emerged he barely reacted. His expression didn't become flooded with relief as though he'd been traumatized in the meanwhile. He kept reading. Kept holding her hand.

He didn't look at her like he pitied her. He didn't agree with her about everything out of indulgence the way the Weasleys had. He complained about the quantity of potatoes she fed him. He whined that wool jumpers were itchy and invented excuses when she tried to make him get more exercise.

He was sad and pensive sometimes, but so was she. Everything between them was at least tinged with sadness.

But she got used to him. It was easy. Familiar.

Gradually she stopped worrying so much.

He didn't do anything to make her worry. He never acted like being there was obligatory. He was just there. Steadily making his way through her library's muggle literature, philosophy, history, and science. Interrogating her about aspects of muggle culture, idioms, or religion when he didn't understand their background.

Eventually she stopped worrying that he would suddenly leave. Stopped worrying that he would be upset when she dissociated. That she'd hurt herself or inconvenience him when it happened. She stopped worrying she'd wake up in a hospital ward again. Stopped worrying she was going to get the committed to the Janus Thickey Ward.

As she stopped worrying, she stopped obsessing. And without obsessing she didn't spiral. And gradually her dissociative spells happened less and less. From several times a day to once a day. And then slowly they spaced out to every few days.

Harry and Ron would visit, to bring new books or groceries or simply to check in on her. And after giving perfunctory greetings Draco always disappeared into his room.

Hermione wished there were friends of Draco's to invite. To send him to see. When she suggested one day that he stop by a pub or try joining a local quidditch chapter he was quiet for a minute before saying, "I'm a Death Eater, Granger."

She dropped the subject after that.

After a few months, she and Draco brewed potions together. The first time she was worried and stressed about it and halfway through her mind slipped away. But when she came back everything was waiting for her. Under stasis. As though time had paused alongside her. Draco closed his book and resumed brewing without a word.

Once she wasn't worried she would burn down her cottage she found Potion brewing calming. There had been so many ideas she'd had. So many things she'd promised herself she'd try when the war was over. She'd assumed she'd have to give them all up.

Draco knew about them all. He knew all her dreams. She'd told him everything about herself at some point during her imprisonment. She'd bared her heart to him.

After two months she felt almost relaxed. Just the mere act of living ceased to drag her under. But sometime the war would come rushing back. Charlie or Luna or someone else. A thought or a sound or smell would catch her off-guard. She'd freeze.

But over time life itself stopped feeling like an insurmountable ordeal.

She was almost happy.

It was nice to not feel afraid all the time. Almost like her stay in St Mungo's with Draco.

Except it had all ended up being a lie.

Everything she had believed while recovering there had come crashing down. And then Draco was whisked away and she was left trying to pick up any pieces that made sense to her.

She kept bracing herself that it would happen again. Waiting for everything to fall apart.

But gradually it began to dawn on her that Draco wasn't going to leave. That he had every intention of staying with her forever. That it was going to be up to her to make him go. And she could hardly bear to think about it.

He felt obligated to her. Guilty.

She didn't want him to stay with her like that.

She wanted him to be happy. She wanted to be cleared from his conscience. She didn't want him to be there because he thought he owed her. She hated that it was why he was there.

She tried to pull away. To force the space between them to broaden. She stopped brewing potions. She ate while she cooked so they stopped sharing meals. She read in her room. When she found herself sitting beside him on the couch she withdrew her hand sharply and walked away without a word.

And in less than a week she started dissociating daily again. When she found herself on the couch beside Draco for the second time in an afternoon she felt nearly faint with horror as she stood up and went outside.

She went down to the beach and set herself to the futile task of angrily flinging driftwood into the waves while she cried. Every stick she threw was dragged back up the beach by the waves and left at her feet again. Each one a little more battered by the brief, pointless journey away.

Draco was trapped by her. She was an impossible cage she didn't know how to free him from. She was dragging him down with her. Stealing away his chance at happiness.

She couldn't offer him anything. She couldn't save herself so he wouldn't feel obliged to. She couldn't even drive him off. Her broken mind was like a cage his guilt had locked him inside of and her attempts to free him had instead reinforced the bars.

She didn't know what to do...

A few days later she blinked and found herself next to Draco while he and Harry were arguing about Quidditch. Harry was standing up, looking tense even as he forced his voice to be causal. Draco appeared entirely at ease. He was seated beside her on the couch with his feet on the coffee table, praising the Wronski Feint. His fingers were absentmindedly interlaced with Hermione's and he drew light circles in the center of her palm with his thumb.

Draco felt her body shift and stopped mid-sentence to glance over at her. A faint smile of greeting played on his lips as he met her eyes.

"Hullo, Granger," Draco said, "Potter came with more groceries. I told him he could return all the potatoes."

Harry's face was slightly guilty as he looked at her. He often looked guilt-stricken after she re-emerged.

"Fat chance," she said tartly to Draco, pulling her hand away. "You still need regain another stone before your clothes fit you properly ." She straightened on the couch and then hopped up to hug Harry.

Draco sighed. "One more stone, and then I am never eating another potato," he said resignedly.

Then he stood and stretched, cracking his neck faintly as he headed to his room. Hermione realised he had probably been sitting with her for hours. Her hands twitched toward him slightly and she had to fight against the urge to reach for him.

"Show me the groceries, Harry," she said, forcing herself to turn away.

Harry had brought a large variety of things other than potatoes. Hermione had used an extension charm to expand her stasis bin in order to hold almost a month's worth of groceries. After she left St Mungo's Hermione had tried to go grocery shopping alone and ended up in muggle hospitals several times. Harry had needed to forge a great deal of paperwork to get her out.

He and Ron managed most errands for her. When she had tried to insist and do things by herself she just ended up wasting everyone's time.

"You're seeming—better," Harry said, as she sorted through the produce.

"Yes," she said, "I think I am."

"Malfoy really makes a difference."

Hermione stiffened. "Maybe. Maybe it's just closure."

Harry gave her a look and she bristled.

"It's not like—we're not—He's just living here. It's nothing more than that," she said. "Hopefully, the dissociation will pretty much stop and he won't feel like he has to stay anymore."

She tried to ignore the tearing sensation inside her chest as she said it. The way her whole body shuddered faintly at the thought.

"But, didn't it before? Before he left? It might just—," Harry hesitated. "Why not have him just stay? Do you not want him to? Haven't you told him that you're—"

"That I'm in love with him? Yes. I told him," she said, studying the potatoes intently. "He's like everyone else. He thinks it's just part of the love potion. Or because of the trauma. He doesn't think I actually could. Which, of course I can hardly blame him. He's lived with me for over a year, watching me crack under a potion induced obsession for him. And he thinks he's somehow responsible for breaking me. Like there was something he was supposed to have done. I see it—it still shows in his eyes when he looks at me sometimes."

"What are you planning to do then?"

She shrugged helplessly.

"I suppose I'll just let him believe my being in love with him fades with the dissociative spells. It's not like—," she broke off and spent several seconds trying to breathe evenly. "We can't—I'm not going to do anything when he thinks it's just because I'm psychologically fractured. If he stayed with me and gave me what I want, he'd always hate himself. He'd always think he was using me. If I act like I've gotten over it, eventually he'll probably be able to move on. And then he can find someone he won't hate himself for being with."

"Do you really think he's going to be able to get over you?" Harry said, looking at her seriously.

Hermione looked up at him sharply.

"He only fell in love with me out of guilt. Once he feels like he's made the necessary amends I don't see why I wouldn't."

"You really think his guilt is the only thing Malfoy sees in you?"

"Well I don't know what else there is to see anymore," she snapped as she struggled not to cry.

There was a pause.

"Do you know why I wasn't surprised that you still were in love with Malfoy after you took the antidote?" Harry asked, wandlessly summoning an apple and starting to eat it.

Hermione said nothing.

"Malfoy gave us copies of his memories. All his memories of you—well, most of them—," he clarified when Hermione looked up at him scarlet-faced. "Snape and Slughorn used them to analyse how the love potion worked. And then they were also used in his trial. So I saw them all. I saw the progression between you two. I spoke to Snape about it recently. I wanted to know exactly how the love potion worked. The truth is, it wasn't really a love potion. Love as a magical force is too powerful to be manipulated. It's impossible to actually make a real love potion. Most potions just fabricate an facet of love. But Damocles got a lot closer than than anyone else. He reversed the method. He didn't try to force love. The way his potion worked was by making you overwhelmingly protective of Malfoy. Then your brain interpreted that need as being because you loved him. It didn't create a delusional infatuation like Amortentia. That's why you didn't need to be redosed. It didn't force anything fake into you. It just planted Malfoy as deeply as it could into an aspect of you that already existed. That's part of why it damaged you so much. It didn't change or layer onto who you were. You wanted to protect the Order, but you always wanted to protect Malfoy more."

Hermione flinched faintly as she remembered everything she'd done. Harry and Ron refused to tell her exactly how many people were killed by her betrayals.

"Remember how Voldemort said he thought you'd be particularly susceptible to it? He was right. For you, your protectiveness is one of the deepest things about you. I don't know if you or Malfoy knew, but Voldemort tried using the potion with other prisoners. It never worked as successfully with anyone else. The effects were a lot more limited."

Hermione froze while she absorbed the information.

"So, when you were in the hospital, once you were sure we weren't going to drag Malfoy away if you closed your eyes, you were different. Once you regarded him as safe. You didn't just look at him to reassure yourself that he was alright. You looked at him because he made you happy. You were always talking about him to Ron and I, but it wasn't like you were delusional. You weren't claiming he was perfect or spending half an hour describing his eyes. You talked about him the way you talk about someone you really cared about. You talked about meaningful things he did for you. It wasn't just protectiveness. So when the antidote worked and you still were in love with him, it didn't really surprise me. I had already realised that you'd actually fallen for him. I just didn't know if that would be too tied up with the love potion to last."

Hermione was shaking faintly as Harry finished talking. Curious though she was, she hadn't ever asked about the potion. She had always been afraid to know.

She straightened the table cloth and then rolled the fabric between her fingers for several minutes as she tried to collect herself.

"Well, it doesn't really matter," Hermione said in a thick voice. "None of that changes how it is for him."

"I just don't think Malfoy is any more likely to get over you than you are to get over him. It's not like it happened just because you saved him a few times. He got to know you before he fell for you. I don't think it's just guilt."

"I don't see why that matters," she said stiffly. "As long as Draco thinks I'm only in love with him because I'm poisoned or insane—It will always be doomed for us. He'll never really be happy here."

"So what are you planning to do?" Harry asked, looking at her carefully.

"If it comes to it, I can always try pretending to move on. Ron would probably be willing to pretend we got back together for a few months."

Harry shook his head in faint disbelief.

"I don't see how that's going to make you happy."

"I'm not really expecting to happy. I just want Draco to be."

"I don't see how that's going to make him happy either."

Hermione fought against the urge to throw a cauldron at Harry.

"Well, I don't know what else to do," she said angrily. "The only other idea I've got is trying to make a time turner capable of going back four months so I can stop myself from going and seeing him after his release. Then he would have just assumed I didn't want to see him and moved on."

"Well, I don't think you should do that either," Harry said calmly, finishing his apple. "For one thing, it would create a paradox. And for another, if you hadn't gone to see him, I was planning to tell him and bring him here anyway."

Hermione looked at Harry enraged. But he didn't even blink as he continued, "I lied for you when he was in prison because you were right, having him know when he was Azkaban wouldn't have made any difference. But everyone agreed that as soon as he was out we were going to bring him here. Because, if he wasn't able to help you, we were going to have you committed at Janus Thickey."

Hermione felt herself go pale with shock as the blood drained from her face. The room swam, feeling like it had tilted slightly sideways and her vision blanked for a moment. She gripped the table to steady herself.

She didn't even know how to verbalize the utter betrayal she felt.

"You—you promised—" she choked out.

"And you lied," Harry said, his face unwavering. "You said you were getting better here. But you weren't. You just kept getting worse and worse. I know you manipulated the charm to only go off after eight hours rather than four. And I was still coming here at least once a week because of it. You commented about how Ron and I came by a lot, you knew about less than a quarter of them."

Hermione felt angry enough to curse Harry. Futile though to would be to try attacking someone who could cast a shield spell without even moving.

Harry's voice was cold. "The thing you seem to be forgetting, Hermione, is that I don't care about Malfoy. I have never cared about Malfoy. I only care about you. And there are only a few things I won't do to protect you. Which is why, before you woke up, I acted as Bonder while Malfoy made an Unbreakable Vow with you. That he will never leave you. And, that if you die, or anything happens to you to make his presence unnecessary, unless I happen to say otherwise, he will voluntarily return to Azkaban to complete his life sentence."

Hermione stood stunned for several seconds, not even able to entirely register what Harry had said. Then the gasped as though she'd been slugged in the stomach by a bludger and stumbled back slightly.

Her body felt cold with horror and rage.

"I am never—going to forgive you for this," she gasped.

Harry was unmoved. "I know. I kind of expected that."

She burst into tears and whipping out her wand she cursed Harry. He'd expected it but she was still faster. Her spell struck him a split second before his shield went up. He slammed into the kitchen wall so hard the house shook.

"How dare you?" she sobbed. "How could you? How could you do that to him? It wasn't his fault!"

She stormed across the kitchen and dragged Harry off the wall where she had pinned him so she could have the satisfaction of punching him in the face. Harry might have been her best friend but she was angry enough to murder him. She felt his nose break under her fist.

Harry forced his magic to through the multiple heavy body-binds she'd cast and dodged before she fractured his eye socket with her next swing. He was mostly trying to ward her off. He had enough raw magical power to suffocate her if he'd wanted to just stop her. A detail that made her even more angry. She kicked him violently between the legs and then in the stomach as he crumpled.

"I am never going to forgive you for this, Harry Potter!" she snarled. "I only wanted one thing! I wanted him to have a chance to be free! To be happy! That was all. I killed for you. I gave my soul for that war and it was all I asked for in exchange. I promised you that I wouldn't commit suicide if you got his sentence reduced and now—" she was crying so hard she could barely force the words out. "You've—chained him—to me—"

She collapsed on the floor and sobbed so hard she couldn't breathe anymore.

"Fuck you, Potter, I told you to break it to her gently. That was the exact opposite of gentle." She was vaguely aware of Draco's enraged voice as she was picked up.

"I don't think there was any way to tell her where she wasn't going to attack me," Harry wheezed, curled into a ball on the floor.

Hermione was still sobbing and her chest kept stuttering as she tried to breathe.

"Granger…Granger...breathe now," Draco said, turning her and studying her face. "Come on. It's alright. I wasn't going anywhere anyway. The only person who had to be convinced of that was you."

She kicked him sharply in the shin.

"You idiot—" she gasped. "How dare you agree?"

"It was my idea," Draco said smirking faintly, smoothing her hair and cradling her face between his hands as he coaxed her into breathing evenly.

She stared at him in shock. He shook his head and sighed before hugging her.

"Granger, today wasn't the first time Potter and I ran into each other here without you realising it. During the first several weeks, he or Weasley came every few hours to check on you. Even the day I arrived. Potter came here shortly after I found you in the kitchen. He didn't tell me everything then, because he hoped there were certain things you'd tell me yourself. But he did give me an overview of how severe things had become. How concerned they were."

"You knew on the beach?" she gasped.

He nodded, sad and serious. "I didn't know you were in love with me, or how the potion worked. Potter and I talked about that later. But I knew you were dissociating for more hours every day than you were alert. That you never left the cottage. That you kept getting worse and worse and you were lying to everyone about it."

She flushed. Draco interlaced his fingers with hers.

"I do know you fairly well, Granger. And so does Potter. You would never have stopped trying to just suffer alone here if you thought it was somehow protecting everyone else. I noticed all your very unsubtle attempts to drive me away because you're convinced I only love you out of guilt."

He snorted faintly and bopped her on the nose with his finger. "I cannot believe you expected I'd just move on if you pretended to be in a relationship with Weasley for a few months. The Vow isn't to stop me. It's to stop you. Even Voldemort realised that there is no level of personal suffering that can stop you. I knew you started to feel guilty that I was here, even before you started trying to push me away. You started going away for longer again. Potter and I discussed it. A vow seemed like the only way to make you stop feeling like you were keeping me here. You are not keeping me here. I am the one keeping me here. I chose those terms because I knew otherwise you might do something to yourself under the delusion that you were setting me free. Now you can stop trying to drive me off. I was never going to leave you. And now, I hope, you will stop trying to make me."

"But—but—" she sobbed. "This wasn't your fault. You shouldn't be the one paying for it. I don't want you to be the one paying for it."

"Granger," Draco said with a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose in irritation. "I did not fall in love with you out of guilt. I realise that this is apparently impossible for you to believe, but I swear it. Yes, I feel guilty. But I didn't fall in love with you because I felt guilty or sorry for you. You are—splendid. You are about a fifty times smarter and more powerful than almost anyone else. Aside from Potter, everyone in the Dark Lord's army knew you were by far the most valuable and dangerous person in the Order. When I wasn't just fretting over my self-preservation what upset me the most from the beginning was seeing someone as exceptional as you being broken to pieces over someone as subpar as me. I knew it was a potion driving you. The reason I fell in love with you was because of all the ways you were still you despite it."

He tucked a curl behind her ear and then stroked her cheek. "You are so brilliant. And capable. And beautiful. And better than me. It was impossible for me not see that. It was part of why I hated you so much at the beginning."

His face was sober and he looked steadily into her eyes as he spoke. "I don't deny that I still feel so guilty about what happened that I occasionally want to obliviate myself. But you were also the only remotely happy thing that happened to me in the entire war. I spent years doing nothing but being afraid of dying. But when I started falling for you I realised that risking or losing my life didn't matter if it gave you a chance. I could have run after the war ended, I knew Potter would do everything he could to find an antidote. But I didn't want to live anywhere knowing you would be suffering because of me. I thought there was a fairly good chance I'd be executed once they cured you and I never minded that. All I wanted was for you to stop being burdened by me. But you're so obstinate, you wouldn't. So now I'm afraid you're stuck with me."

Hermione stood there reeling with shock. She felt drained and still mostly overcome by horror.

"I don't expect you to believe me about all this yet," Draco continued, "'Maybe ever. But I hope you will stop burdening yourself over me. I'm with you because I choose to be. And if worst comes to worst, and you really do get over me, we'll just have to be neighbors for the rest of our lives. And I will endeavor to not murder your spouse out of jealousy. Please stop crying."

Hermione absently rubbed her tears away with the back of her hands. She stood for a second longer while Harry picked himself gingerly off the ground and Draco stared down at her with a sober expression. Then she turned on her heel and walked out of the room. She went into her bedroom and, shutting the door firmly behind herself, slid to the floor. She was numb with shock.

What did she do now? She felt sick.

She sat there, unmoving, deep in thought for a long time. Hours later she finally picked herself up off the floor and went to find Draco in the living room. Reading.

She sat on the edge of a chair and stared at him.

"I don't understand, why didn't you leave yourself an opening for if I recover? It's hasn't even been two years since the war ended. I might fully recover in a few more years and you'd still be trapped with me."

"Has it not occurred to you, Granger, that I don't want to leave?"

"Really, so if you can't be with me you might as well be in Azkaban?" she said in a corrosive tone.

"Pretty much, although that part was mostly for your benefit. Not mine."

"My benefit?" Hermione scoffed. "You've forcibly made me responsible for your life. Again. And this time there isn't even any hope of an antidote," she said, her voice filled with bitter tears.

Draco flinched slightly at that.

"What would you do, Hermione? If you were me? What would you do?" he said in a cold voice. "If you were in love with someone who refused to believe you could be? Who assumed everything you did was borne from guilt? Even loving them? Who was determined to push you away, even though the action was slowly shattering them? Again—because all that person ever did was break themself for you? What ingenious solution would you devise?"

Hermione said nothing. Draco looked away from her and stared out the window at the sea. She could see the hurt in his eyes.

"You don't need to believe me," he said after a minute. "I don't need you to. You just need to accept that I'm not going to leave you. And that it's not your fault that I'm here."

Hermione was quiet for several minutes.

"Do you believe that I love you?" she asked.

He looked over at her. His expression was sad and pensive.

"I want to," he said, "but you must understand how difficult I find it to believe."

"Why?"

"Probably for the same reason you have so much trouble believing I legitimately love you. Because we're both deeply insecure people who have a habit of hiding it behind false bravado and academics." He stared at her for a moment longer before dropping his gaze. "But learning about how the potion worked makes wanting to believe you feel less like a fool's hope."

His hands were clenched into fists. She stood up, walked over to him and sat down on his right side. She curled up tightly, wrapped both her arms around his arm, and laid her head on his shoulder. She could feel the scars mottling his skin faintly through his shirt.

"What happened will always be part of us," she said quietly after several minutes. "It will always define us. If we try to pretend it's not at our foundation, it will always be a lie. There's no wishing it away. Wherever we end up, it will always be where we started."

"I know."

"But good things can come from ashes," she added in a voice so hesitant it shook. "Maybe—if we give it time."

He nodded without a word.

There was nothing else to say. They gave it time.

Hermione stopped stressing that Draco was still there. Though his presence still made her heart ache with regret.

His behavior was the same. Even before the Vow he had never seemed inclined to go out alone, even briefly. She had to physically drag him from the cottage just to make him exercise.

The weeks turned into months. They ventured together into muggle villages and cities. Hermione began doing her own grocery shopping with Draco. Neither of them had the stomach for the attention the wizarding world was eager to bestow upon them, especially if they appeared together. They stayed away. They wrote articles for Potion Journals and submitted them under amusing pseudonyms. The cottage grew so crowded with books that they had to use expansion charms on all the rooms.

And gradually, time created space between them that wasn't wholly defined by the war. Walks and conversations and books and melted cauldrons and unfunny jokes that were solely theirs.

There was a fond familiarity that grew between them rather than a sense of desperation and devastation. Things grew increasingly wistful. Every familiar touch had a tendency towards lingering for an extra moment before being sharply withdrawn.

The keen, doubtful longing between them grew palpable.

Hermione's mind still slipped away. But rarely. And not for long. And Draco was always waiting for her.

One day, she blinked and found him with her outside. She had been walking along the beach. She had gone without him. It was cold. Wet. Drizzling. So clammy she could taste the salt in the air.

He didn't like the cold. Not the cold or the wind or rain. Not since Azkaban.

It had been raining for days and she had grown fidgety after being inside so long. So she had gone on her own. To watch the tide come in. To feel the rain on her skin. To taste the wind.

As she watched the waves breaking, the roar of them made her think of dragons.

Charlie.

She remembered when the Death Eaters dragged him out. He'd worried for his dragons, they were the last things he spoke of. His mind had been cracked using the spell and potion she'd given Voldemort. He hadn't realised she'd been the one who betrayed him. He'd told her she was beautiful.

He hadn't struggled as she pulled him into her arms and murdered him.

The feeling of his blood… Seeping into her clothes. Into her skin.

She could still feel it. In her skin—

Draco was there. Standing in front of her in the pouring rain. Soaked to the bone. He hadn't even pulled on a jumper. His shirt was clinging to him.

He was shivering faintly.

She hurriedly drew her wand and cast a warming charm on him.

"I'm sorry," she said, "you're so cold."

She dragged him back to the cottage and peeled his shirt off of him the moment they got through the door. She summoned towels and blankets and got the fire roaring on the hearth. She kept muttering warming charms and rubbing his fingers between her hands.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry," she kept saying. "I didn't want you to come out."

"It's fine. I've been much colder in the past," he said dismissively once his teeth stopped chattering. "I'm not the only one who's soaking wet."

She was dripping. She hadn't noticed. She cast a quick dying charm on herself.

"You could have done that to me too," he said with faint amusement. She looked up and realised that she'd pulled half of his clothes off. She flushed scarlet.

"Sorry, I—," her voice trailed off. She had no excuse.

"It's alright."

She suddenly became highly conscious that he was more disrobed around her than he'd been since the war had ended. She couldn't drag her eyes away.

She wanted to reach out and touch him. Feel the rhythm of his heartbeat under her fingers. She used to sleep with her head on his chest, listening to the steady tempo. Reassuring herself that he was safe.

She had barely slept in his manor. She was always worried that if she closed her eyes Voldemort would summon him without her. She had nightmares of him writhing and screaming in agony under the cruciatus. Or of when he was cursed because she'd refused to tell Voldemort about her occlumency potion.

Her eyes flicked up to Draco's shoulder.

After he'd been cursed. After she'd given Voldemort the information, Draco had been shaking, nearly unconscious, and steadily going into shock despite her basic remedial spells. She had prostrated herself on the floor, begging Voldemort to have Draco taken to St Mungo's.

She'd been refused.

As additional punishment for her defiance. There would be no healers provided. If she took him to St Mungo's, Voldemort would personally curse Draco's other shoulder the following week.

Hermione had taken Draco back to his manor and healed him as best she could. Drawing on every scrap of healing knowledge she had ever learned.

He'd always carry the scars. She knew it hurt more when he got cold. He never told her but she noticed his expression got tighter and he tended to favor it on cold days.

Her fingers brushed over the scars.

"I'm sorry," she said again. "We should move. Somewhere that isn't so cold.

He caught her hand.

"It's fine," he said, entwining his fingers with hers. "I actually went to find you because I had something I wanted to tell you."

"What about the South of France? Or Greece? I went there once with my parents. Or Australia. No one would know us there."

"It's fine," he said again.

"It's not. It's too cold for you here. And you don't have any friends. You're practically a prisoner—" she was near tears and she tried to twist her hand free.

Draco didn't let go. He pulled her closer, until their faces were nearly touching. She dropped her eyes and stared down at their entwined fingers.

"Hermione, I wanted to tell you something," he said quietly. His breath ghosted across her cheek.

She looked up sharply. They were so close. The longing between them sang with the sobbing intensity of a violin. If she turned her head their lips would touch. She trembled faintly and jerked her head in the opposite direction.

She felt as though all the air had vanished from the room.

She wanted to turn back. To lay her hand on his cheek or on his neck. To feel to sensation of his pulse quickening and to watch his eyes dilate before she pressed her lips against his. To have him wrap his arms around her waist as he pulled her closer and their hearts raced in the same tempo. To know if his skin tasted the way it used to. To feel his hands, cool at first touch but with heat beneath, sliding along her spine...

A log in the fire cracked and sent up sparks.

She drew away.

"What is it?" she said.

Draco tilted her face up toward his, slowly leaned forward, closing the space once more as he whispered, "I wanted to tell you that I believe you. That you love me."

Then he paused a moment as her eyes widened. Her heart felt like it had stalled for a moment before taking off with the speed of frightened rabbit. She stared at him. Waiting to blink. Waiting for everything to come crashing down. To find she'd grown delusional.

Her hands had intentions of their own. She grasped the blanket she'd draped over his shoulders and pulled them infinitesimally closer before catching herself.

Her eyes were locked on his face, on his eyes. Looking for any doubt. Hesitation. He was staring back at her evenly.

"You—do—?" she stuttered uncertainly.

He nodded carefully. Not breaking eye contact.

"I have been thinking about it quite a lot. You see, you kicked me quite painfully in the shins a few months ago. And you never would have hurt me like that under the potion. So by process of elimination I'm forced to concede that there are no other plausible—"

She lunged forward and captured his lips with hers.

"I do," she said fervently as she tangled her fingers in his hair. "I do."

He drew her into his arms and they crushed each other. It was a kiss without apologies. An inferno of desire and joyous relief. Like coming home from a journey she hadn't expect to survive. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pressed herself against him while she poured her heart out against his lips.

"Do you really? Do you really believe me?" she said hesitantly, drawing back.

He looked her in the eye as he nodded. She sobbed with relief and kissed him again. He combed his fingers through her hair and arched her neck back so he could kiss along it and taste her skin.

They had fallen through Hell and caught hold of one another along the way. And when they landed they found that their broken pieces fit together.

She tried not to cry while she clung to him but she couldn't seem to stop herself. The tears slid silently down her cheeks. When she sat back to try to brush them away she realised that he was crying too.

She had never seen him cry. Not when he'd been tortured. Not during all the time they had been together. Not when he'd given her the antidote and turned to leave. Not when he'd been released from prison. His voice broke and his face twisted with emotion, but he never cried.

She wipe away his tears.

"I love you," Draco murmured as he cradled her face between his hands and brushed away hers.

"I believe you," she said, pressing her cheek against his palm and running her own fingers over the arch of his cheekbone.

He was still thin. He was always thin. But the gauntness had faded. The pain and devastation from the war wasn't all the showed in his eyes. Affection shone through far brighter.

"I will always love you," she said, "even if I forgot my whole life. I think I would still look for you. I would always feel that you were missing."

She placed her fingertips lightly on the scars of his shoulder.

"I will always be a little bit broken," she said tremulously. "But I will do my best to love you well."

He pulled her into his arms so that her head rested against the crook of his shoulder. "You love better than anyone. The only thing I ever questioned was your taste."

They made love that night. Without apologies or forgiveness. Not to escape or forget. They simply loved each other.

They had taken the horror and the fragmented shards of each other and built it into something true. It was imperfect. The tragedy of it would always be visible. The cracks would always show. But it was theirs.

They had built it together with all they had left.

Their world gradually grew larger. They travelled. To Ilvermorny. They got potion masteries. They were as close to happy as they knew how to be.

But for Hermione there was always one detail that pained her.

"I just wish—," she told Draco one day, "I wish you hadn't made an Unbreakable Vow. I wish you were just here because you want to be. And not also because you have to."

He looked at her for a moment and then smiled faintly. "Wish granted."

She looked up at him startled.

"There was no Vow," Draco admitted. "Potter and I made it up. We didn't know if something so extreme would make it better or worse. So we decided to test it and see. We didn't want to do anything irreversible without being certain it would help."

Hermione stared.

"You—What?" she finally forced out.

"I didn't want you to worry," he said, taking her hand. "I wanted you to know that I wasn't going to go anywhere. I've always been with you just because I wanted to be."


End file.
